WII to conduct study on turtles

Over one-lakh Olive Ridley turtles have died in Orissa in last 10 yrs due to the fishing trawlers, reports Chetan Chauhan.

Updated on: Oct 23, 2006, 23:27:00 IST

None | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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A three-year long study to understand the impact of oil exploration and rampant fishing on Olive Ridley Turtles and marine life off the east coast of India is being conducted by the Wildlife Institute of India (WII).

Unofficial estimates are that over one-lakh turtles have died in Orissa alone in the last decade due to use of trawlers for fishing.

The turtles exclusive to three nesting sites in Orissa, Gahirmath in the Bhitarkanika Wildlife Sanctuary, the mouth of river Rushikulya and mouth of river of river Devi, have been victims of fishing close to the coast and oil exploration activity.

While there have been several independent studies (mostly by foreign organisations) on the turtles, the WII study will be first of its kind in its magnitude by a government agency. Orissa government in 2001 conducted a small study on turtles in river Rushikulya in 2001 and found that turtles migrate from areas under heavy fishing activity.

According to PR Sinha, Director (WII), the movement pattern of turtles on the eastern coast till Sri Lanka will be studied over a period of three years. “We are in the process of setting up infrastructure to start research by the year end,” he told Hindustan Times.

The study gains significance as Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas has plans for major oil exploration on the eastern coast. “The territory is still largely unexplored though some private firms like Reliance are working on some oil exploration projects,” a ministry official said.

The Ministry of Environment and Forest officials said that WII study would play a pivotal role in allowing environment clearance for future projects on eastern coast. Also, India does not have extensive research on impact on sea life and its degradation because of human activities. “We expect the study to provide some useful inputs as entire coast is being covered,” a ministry official said.

There is, however, substantial research on the degradation of the coastal belt. One such study in Kutch earlier this year reported huge loss of marine life because of oil spills.

According to Sinha, radio collaring of 70 turtles on the eastern coast will be done and their movements will be recorded for a period of two years. As the turtles travel large distance and many times till Sri Lanka, the data generated will provide useful information, Sinha said. Their movement will be tracked using satellite imagery. In addition to radio collaring, studies on the beaches near the nesting sites will be also conducted.

The study sponsored by Director General Hydrocarbons at a cost of Rs three crore will influence government policy for future oil exploration in the Indian seas. Number of NGOs have protested against giving oil exploration contracts off the coast of Orissa by the ministry of petroleum in the past few years NGOs like Greenpeace have run global campaigns against the government’s oil exploration policy.

Email Author: chetan@hindustantimes.com

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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